Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
DETAILED ACTION
Status of the Application
This Office Action is in response to Applicant’s Application filed on 11/16/2023, and subsequent Preliminary Amendment filed 11/16/2023.
Claims 1-9 are pending for this examination.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant's claim for foreign priority based on an application filed in Japan on 2/02/2023. It is noted, however, that applicant has not filed a certified copy of the JP2023-014656 application as required by 37 CFR 1.55.
More specifically, Examiner notes that the IFW for this case shows a retrieval request was unsuccessful entry on 7/02/2024, where an attempt for document retrieval under the priority document exchange program failed on 7/02/2024. Examiner requests Applicants to double check the filing of the certified copy just in case.
Amendment to Specifications
The amendments to the specification received on 11/16/2023 are acceptable.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 11/16/2023 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 U.S.C. § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
The phrase “in the vicinity of the equipment” in claim 9 is a relative term which renders the claim indefinite. The phrase “in the vicinity of the equipment” is not defined by the claim, the specification does not provide a standard for ascertaining the requisite degree, and one of ordinary skill in the art would not be reasonably apprised of the scope of the invention.
More specifically, Examiner points out that this phrase if overly broad to the point where a person of reasonable skill in the art would not be able to define the limit to what “vicinity” stops at such that two different persons of ordinary skill in the art may disagree on where the bounds of a vicinity are, i.e. how close does a sensor need to be to still be considered “in the vicinity of” the equipment. For example, one person can say a vicinity can be within x meter of the equipment, another person may say that it counts as being within the vicinity of as long as it’s within a same room, a third may say as that anything connectable through wired or wireless means counts as within the vicinity, etc. As such this phrase would be regarded as an indefinite phrase rendering the scope of the claim indefinite.
MPEP 2173.05(b) part II indicates that “A claim may be rendered indefinite when a limitation of the claim is defined by reference to an object and the relationship between the limitation and the object is not sufficiently defined. That is, where the elements of a claim have two or more plausible constructions such that the examiner cannot readily ascertain positional relationship of the elements, the claim may be rendered indefinite. See, e.g., Ex parte Miyazaki, 89 USPQ2d 1207 (Bd. Pat. App. & Inter. 2008) (precedential) and Ex parte Brummer, 12 USPQ2d 1653 (Bd. Pat. App. & Inter. 1989).”
Furthermore, Examiner notes that from the way the current claim language is written, it is also vague as to whether a sensor “in the vicinity of the equipment” would have to be connected to the equipment in any manner, i.e. a standalone independent sensor not connected to / a part of the equipment that might be unrelated to the equipment can read upon the current claim language. Examiner recommends Applicants clarify what is meant by “vicinity” or to remove this phrase from the claim altogether. For the purposes of this examination, Examiner will the interpreting the phrase “in the vicinity of the equipment” to mean the sensor is connected to the equipment in a manner that communication between the equipment and the sensor is possible.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-9 are indicated as allowable subject matter.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Prior art teaches artificial neural network processors and variants such as convolution neural networks processors and recurrent neural network processors that include multiple units arranged in parallel that can perform multiply-accumulate operations on input data including data from sensors, however, the prior art does not fairly teach or suggest, individually or in combination, a reservoir computer comprising a reservoir layer and read layer, the reservoir layer, i.e. a memory or buffer, receiving time-series signals and input signals, i.e. time-series signals being defined using the standard definition of a time-varying quantity recorded in chronological order that represents a physical event or dynamic measurement, and the read layer having the reservoir layer divided into a plurality of sub-reservoirs each having a plurality of neurons, i.e. hardware, that includes a selector, multiplier with a weight value, and integrator / accumulator integrating multiplication results which functions as claimed, and an activation function calculator that calculates the output value of an activation function that uses the accumulated / integration results as an input, where the read layer performs product-sum calculations using a read weight on the output signals from the plurality of reservoir neurons included in each sub-reservoir and outputs a calculation results as the output signal of the reservoir computer as claimed, which is used to determine the state of equipment. Examiner notes interpretation of the claim language includes an echo state network being a type of recurrent neural network (RNN) that uses continuous neuron-like units to retain short-term memory of past inputs, a neuron is just a term that can include any hardware taking an input and sending an output, a reservoir computing to be a machine learning framework for processing sequential data by passing inputs through a fixed, randomized, non-linear system, i.e. just a computer system processing sequential input data, and reservoirs to be a black box that has to include the ability to store information and have non-linear elements to process input signals for example a state machine, quantum computer, etc.. Examiner find prior arts such as Febbo et al. (US 2021/0279557) that teaches a neural processor taking inputs from image and motion sensors and passing these inputs through a neural processing circuit comprising multiple neural engines each having buffer circuits, control circuits, a plurality of multiply-add (MAD) circuits, an accumulator connected to all the MAD circuits outputting to a post-processor for applying a linear function before being sent to output to an data processing circuit taking in the outputs of the plurality of neural engines, where the neural engines perform computations including multiplying input data to a kernel coefficient, i.e. a weight, determining the value of an activation function, determining a weight sum of polynomial, etc.. However, Examiner finds that prior art does not specifically teach the reservoir computing system with the activation function calculator in each “neuron” calculating an output value of the activation function whether the integration result of the integrator / accumulator is set as an input, and wherein the read layer perform a product-sum / multiply-accumulate calculation using read weight on the output signals from the plurality of neurons in each sub-reservoir to output a calculation result as claimed in independent claim 1, and further specified that this output signal is used to indicate the state of the equipment as claimed in claim 9. The prior art of record neither anticipates nor renders obvious the above recited combination.
As allowable subject matter has been indicated, applicant's reply must either comply with all formal requirements or specifically traverse each requirement not complied with. See 37 CFR 1.111(b) and MPEP § 707.07(a).
Examiner Notes
To reiterate, Examiner finds that the phrase “in the vicinity of the equipment” to be problematic from multiple angles, 1) an issue of degree to which Applicants still consider what the vicinity is, and 2) whether the sensor “in the vicinity of the equipment” would mean that a standalone sensor not connected to / a part of the equipment would also count, i.e. a sensor in an environment that is unrelated to the equipment in the same space can read upon the current claim language. This phrase affects the what the scope of the invention covers and would require immediate clarification and/or amendment.
Relevant Prior Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Febbo et al. (US 2021/0279557) teaches a neural processor taking inputs from image and motion sensors and passing these inputs through a neural processing circuit comprising multiple neural engines each having buffer circuits, control circuits, a plurality of multiply-add (MAD) circuits, an accumulator connected to all the MAD circuits outputting to a post-processor for applying a linear function before being sent to output to an data processing circuit taking in the outputs of the plurality of neural engines, where the neural engines perform computations including multiplying input data to a kernel coefficient, i.e. a weight, determining the value of an activation function, determining a weight sum of polynomial, etc.
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL SUN whose telephone number is (571)270-1724. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8am-4pm EST.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jyoti Mehta can be reached on 571-270-3995. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MICHAEL SUN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2183
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